Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to provide elements to answer the question of whether neuro-rights and related concepts (such as “mind”, “consciousness”, etc.) can be considered, from a technical-normative point of view, as indeterminate legal concepts. To this end, we will first (a) review the main elements that make up the doctrinal discussion on indeterminate legal concepts, and then (b) analyse whether they can be applied to the aforementioned concepts, which are increasingly used in deontological fields. In view of the ambiguity of the concept of neuro-rights and of the terms associated with it, the article concludes that they are vague expressions that present a hermeneutic space, the amplitude of which varies in each case, but which should necessarily exist within legal systems. Thus, despite the ambiguity and indeterminacy of the notion of “neuro-rights” and the concepts associated to neurology, the use of these notions seems ultimately inevitable insofar as the core of normative vagueness that characterises them is precisely what will enable legislation in the face of technological developments that require a response from the law.